NATCHITOCHES – Brandon Jordan of Many won first place in PC Troubleshooting, Cyber Security and Capture the Flag at the U.S. Information Technology Collegiate Conference in Springfield, Missouri. 

Justin Dysarz of Sugar Land, Texas, won seventh place in the qualifying round of Cyber Security a day after earning his Security+ certification. Dysarz also took part in the first-ever USITCC Hackathon event in application development. 

Northwestern State students have won 22 national championships in various information technology competitions since 2000.   

The USITCC is produced by the Foundation for IT Education as part of its ongoing efforts to fulfill its mission of promoting information technology research and education and to encourage and support individuals entering and considering entering the information technology profession.  The Foundation offers scholarships to students enrolled in undergraduate collegiate information technology-related programs across America. 

Jordan, a senior computer information systems major, won the PC Troubleshooting competition for the second year in a row. 

According to Jordan, this year’s PC Troubleshooting competition was similar to the previous year’s. Students took a qualifying exam. The finals involved troubleshooting a virtual computer. The security competition was more difficult. Jordan said the Capture the Flag event had a number of changes, 

“The competition required active application of hacking and security skills to find flags hidden through various means,” said Jordan. “This encompassed steganography, cryptography, OSINT, general file forensics and hash cracking.” 

Over the last year, Jordan engaged in some other Capture the Flag competitions, as well as general hacking practice on HackTheBox that he feels helped him gain added knowledge. He also gained experience from security-oriented classes at Northwestern that he believes allowed him to win the security competition. 

“My success brings a positive air to NSU’s CIS program for having a back-to-back national champion, and I could not have done it without the support of such professors as Dr. (Curtis) Penrod, Dr. (Jason) Powell, Dr. (Sarah) Wright, and Dr. (Eddie) Horton. They urged me to compete in these competitions and provided assistance which allowed me to attend. That was what helped me to achieve such great wins.” 

Dysarz said the hackathon was a two-day event where competitors planned out a system and then built it. It was in groups that ranged from one to four people. Dysarz competed alone and got through the design phases and worked on building an app in C. HIs project for the competition was an anonymous chatting application with privacy and security first.  

“Getting my Security+ certification the day we started the trip to the competition is the main reason I got seventh place in the first phase security competition and made finals,” said Dysarz, a senior computer information systems major. “I have never taken a cybersecurity course and most of my knowledge on the topic came from an outdated textbook from Amazon and YouTube videos. I was surprised with the results of the exam and the first phase security competition and am excited for the next competition since I will have a lot more time to prepare for the security competition.” 

For more information on NSU’s program in computer information systems, go to https://www.nsula.edu/cis. 

Caption 

Northwestern State University computer information systems majors Brandon Jordan, left, and Justin Dysarz competed at the U.S. Information Technology Collegiate Conference in Springfield, Missouri. Jordan won first place in PC Troubleshooting, Cyber Security and Capture the Flag. Dysarz won seventh place in the qualifying round of Cyber Security.